1. Field
The present disclosure relates generally to tools and, in particular, to tools containing gears. Still more particularly, the present disclosure relates to a method and apparatus for removing a gear from a tool.
2. Background
Tools may take the form of powered mechanical devices. A tool may be, for example, without limitation, a lathe, a milling machine, a drill, a grinder, and/or some other suitable type of tool. Tools may be used in fabricating structures as well as used during maintenance of objects. These structures may include, for example, an aircraft, an engine, a wing, a wheel, and/or some other suitable structure.
Many mechanical tools include gears. Depending on the construction and arrangement, gears may be used to transmit forces at different torques, speeds, and/or directions from the device turning the first gear.
A gear is a component that may transmit rotational force to another gear and/or device. A gear may be a round wheel that has linking features that may mesh with linking features in other gears and/or devices. These linking features may be referred to as teeth and/or cogs.
With drills, an air motor may be present that may transfer rotations from one speed to another speed. For example, an air motor for a drill may rotate at around 20,000 revolutions per minute. This speed may be reduced to perform drilling operations. For example, the speed may be a speed of around 1,500 revolutions per minute through a gear system. The gear system may be located in a case or other suitable object.
The output of this gear system may take the form of a bevel gear. This bevel gear may engage a gear in another portion of the drill to change the direction of rotation.
A bevel gear may be a conically-shaped device in which the linking features may take the form of teeth. The teeth may be straight cut, have a spiral bevel, have a zero bevel, or have some other shape.
Occasionally, maintenance may be performed on the gear system for the drill. For example, without limitation, debris may be present within the gear system, lubrication may be needed, and/or some other maintenance operation may need to be performed on components in the gear system.
Currently, when disassembling the gear system, the bevel gear is removed to provide access to the other components within the gear system. Removing this bevel gear is currently performed using a pipe wrench that may engage the linkage features in the bevel gear. This pipe wrench, however, may bend, crush, cause plastic deformation, and/or otherwise damage the bevel gear. As a result, when removing the bevel gear to access other components within the gear system, the bevel gear often may require replacement.
This type of operation increases the cost of maintenance for a drill. As a result, the expense in manufacturing products also may increase. Further, in some cases, a replacement bevel gear may be unavailable. As a result, the drill is unusable until a replacement bevel gear is obtained. As a result, delays and/or reduced throughput in manufacturing objects may occur.
Therefore, it would be advantageous to have a method and apparatus that takes into account one or more of the issues discussed above, as well as possibly other issues.